Think Or Shrink

THINK

OR

SHRINK

THINK

OR

SHRINK

Explore your mind

to expand your life.

LEHLOHONOLO LUCAS MAZINDO

Copyright © 2017 Lehlohonolo Mazindo

Published by Lehlohonolo Mazindo Publishing at Smashwords

First edition 2017

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage or retrieval system without permission from the copyright holder.

The Author has made every effort to trace and acknowledge sources/resources/individuals. In the event that any images/information have been incorrectly attributed or credited, the Author will be pleased to rectify these omissions at the earliest opportunity.

Foreword

Lehlohonolo Mazindo is not just a prolific writer in our times, but also a leader who knows the challenges that our society is facing at this moment. This piece of writing is meant to change our line of thinking, our perceptions and attitude towards life. Mr. Mazindo is not relying only on his academic background to produce the kind of writing that he produced, but he is the man who grew up facing the challenges that many ordinary South Africans are facing.

He had to defy his odds to attain his first university degree. Whether one fails or succeeds in life is not dependent on the background; it lies with the power of one’s mind. Apartheid paralyzed our thinking and instilled fear in our minds. Many people are scared to resign from their jobs and try something new, because we are possessed by fear of failure. From our childhood we were told to go to school so that we can find ourselves decent jobs tomorrow. Our parents raised us to be employees, not employers; and our education system also produces employees, not employers.

The relevance of this writing is to assist one to overcome this background and completely set one free from sense of fear. Many of us believe that should we try to open businesses, those businesses are more likely to fail than succeed. Today South Africa is having a big problem of corruption, and many people don’t understand where the problem is coming from, including politicians themselves; they don’t understand why they behave in that manner. The problem is the mind, and the fear of failure. Most of them ask themselves one question, What will happen to me if I am not elected in the next coming five years? Hence they decide to do things that degrade them. Our political leaders need to be liberated from their own fears.

Lack of knowledge and skill brings fear, and fear brings disgrace. We need to be liberated from our fears if we want to claim our space in today’s economy. We need to renew our minds and stop seeing ourselves as the victims of apartheid. Our young people do not need government’s social grants; they need good education and training. Liberation comes through knowledge, not through being given things.

Today young South Africans are talking about economic freedom in our lifetime, but we are not going to achieve that until our minds are renewed; we need to change how we look at ourselves. This book will assist us to bury our fears and face our day to day challenges with skill, knowledge and courage. This is the writing that will change employees to be employers. It’s a form of writing that says to you, you are the child of this universe and you have the right to be here, you belong. Everyone who will read this book is bound to change and change everything around him or her.

Gaboganenwe Klaas Majaphage

Attorney and founder of GK MAJAPHAGE ATTORNEYS

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Foreword

Preface

1. As He Thinketh...

2. Positive Thinking

3. Peculiarity Thinking

4. Purposeful Thinking

5. Particularity Thinking

6. Priority Thinking

7. Passionate Thinking

8. Proficient Thinking

9. Participative Thinking

10. Partnership Thinking

11. Progressive Thinking

12. Perpetual Thinking

13. Perceptive Thinking

14. Practical Thinking

15. Productive Thinking

16. Permanence Thinking

17. Don’t Just Breathe, Live!!!

Bonus Chapter I: Not Easily Distracted

Bonus Chapter II: Follow Your Dream

Bonus Chapter III: Your Best Life Is Within You

Bonus Chapter IV: The Success Phobia

Bonus Chapter V: Don’t Just Achieve; Become!

Preface

Life is the most precious gift a person could ever have. It is a one time opportunity we cannot afford to miss. It is thus highly significant that we live our lives effectively while there is time, because once life ends, it will never commence again. One shot is all you have, and there could never be another chance to try again. The most mysterious thing about life is that no one knows when it will end; but everybody who was born will die one day.

Unfortunately, the world is full of people who live their lives as if they are immortal, or as if they know how much time they have before they die. They have no sense of urgency in fulfilling their purpose. They let time just pass as if it will come back their way again. They invest none of their time into the commitment of developing themselves or working to fulfil their destiny. They live as they please and not as they should, as if tomorrow is guaranteed to them. But the reality of the matter is that any day could be your last day.

Question is, what difference would you have made in this world by the time your life is over? How will you be remembered after you are gone? There’s more to life than just occupying space; you must live to make a difference – you must change the world and leave it better than you found it. No time for excuses, you have a destiny to fulfil, and you only have one lifetime to do it. You were born for greatness, and there’s no need for you to die small.

By the time you leave this planet, it must be known that you were here; you must leave your footprints not only on sand, but also on stones and steels. You must leave a mark that will never be erased. The coming generations must look at your tomb and thank God you came this way. You must purpose in your heart that there’s no way you were born to die and leave the world the same as you found it.

With all its many challenges, life also comes with countless opportunities. But most often we miss these opportunities because they usually present themselves to us wrapped in oppositions. It is our tendency to focus solely on oppositions that diverts our attention from opportunities therein. What you focus on the most will ultimately become the dominant thought in your life; and it is that thought that will dominate your life until you die, unless you change your focus and transform your thinking.

Is your focus directed through oppositions to seize the opportunities within them? Or is your attention diverted by oppositions from pursuing those opportunities? The one you focus on is the one that will apply in your life. You can either look through the challenges of life and press towards your goals, or be limited by oppositions from seizing the opportunities that would make your life great.

In point of fact, it is your perception of the oppositions that determines whether you grow or shrink. If what you perceive in an opposition is defeat, you will retreat and surrender into a life of mediocrity; but if you can perceive it as an opportunity, you will be inspired to march through it to pursue your dream until you fulfil your destiny.

This book was written to help you exercise your thinking such that you reach ultimate success in your life. The power of the mind cannot be emphasised adequately. There’s no doubt that behaviour is first conceived in the mind before it manifests in reality. Whatever we experience today is mainly the result of the thoughts we entertained in the past. Similarly, whatever we will experience in the future will be the result of the thoughts we entertain in our minds today.

In this book you will learn to exercise your thinking capacity in very practical ways by exploring various thinking approaches. You will also be inspired to live your life according to God’s original intent – a life of fulfilment and great success. I have consolidated various principles that have worked for all the successful people I have studied over the years and presented them in a concise and easy-to-understand method. As you read through these pages, I believe you will be empowered to explore your mind and expand your life.

1

As He Thinketh...

For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he...

– Proverbs 23:7 (KJV)

Believe it or not, the distance between you and your desired life is just between your left ear and your right ear. But sadly, this is the road least travelled by the vast majority of people across the globe; yet it is the only way to reach our ideal lives. This road I am referring to is the brain, the organ that is in charge of all our thought processes. The truth of the matter is, we all have the intellectual capacity to think ourselves out of any form of malady and into great accomplishments, yet we very seldom, if ever, use this precious ability.

When the brain gets damaged, the heart may still beat, and the blood may still run through the veins, but the whole body gets paralysed, and a person becomes as good as dead – no movement, no sensation, no feeling, no perception. The majority of people all over the world are fortunate to have their brains in perfect working condition, but sadly those brains are not utilised sufficiently. Our lives are terribly worn out and hideously miserable, but our brains are as good as new because they are dismally under-utilised. In a nutshell, we shrink because we do not think.

We are the products of our own thoughts, and this is the fact that all scientists and philosophers fully agree on. Even the Bible confirms it in Proverbs 23:7 – for as he thinketh in his heart, so is he... Simply put, we are what we think. It is our thoughts that brought us where we are, and it is the same that will take us where we are going. This explains why the planet has such an enormous discrepancy between the extremely wealthy people and extremely poor ones sharing the same space.

Same oxygen, same natural resources, equal opportunities, yet vastly different qualities of life among the inhabitants of the earth. We live under one blue sky, but we differ like chalk and cheese in terms of our economic positions. These economic discrepancies are apparently not in our bank accounts, they are right between our ears – in our minds. Considering all these facts, I can confidently hypothesize that success is not the state of the economy, it is the state of the mind; and poverty is not a financial problem, it is a mental problem.

Some people are so poor that the only thing they have is money. Otherwise they have no peace, no joy, no knowledge, no wisdom, no love, and no character. They possess titanic bank accounts, but they have tiny minds. Their money serves only their appetites. They cannot even use a fraction of their belongings to help other people. They have money, but they are still poor. They are hoarders whose existence benefits no one but themselves. They have houses, but no homes; money, but no